The Never Paradox (Chronicles Of Jonathan Tibbs Book 2)

by T. Ellery Hodges

  Seeing it now, he wished he could rewind, go back and ask her to explain, promise her that he would keep an open mind. Having failed to do this, he was growing increasingly sure that he was the clueless one and now had no way to find the only person who knew what was going on.

  Tired and irritated with himself, he entered the kitchen. Collin and Hayden stood over the table, staring down at comic book panels and a mess of poorly-organized notes. They nodded to him as he entered, then continued staring at their mess as he pulled some food out of the refrigerator and tossed it into the microwave. Standing against the counter as he waited, he watched as his two roommates struggled with the continued arc of their comic book series. It was seldom that they were this quiet.

  Collin and Hayden’s first run at the digital marketing of their comic book—a rebooting of the Gospels that portrayed Jesus as a parody of Superman—had been more successful than they’d expected. Apparently, the two of them arguing on message boards—which, frankly, sounded exactly like when they bickered in real life—had garnered a larger internet following than either of them had anticipated. Their posts had an avid group of devoted fans who often dropped their two cents into the conversation. When they’d released the first three books and started notifying the boards that they were producing the comic as a team, a modest viral reaction to the series had occurred. Now, the two seemed stalled on the next three books, the success having sapped the fun out of writing it. They had difficulty agreeing on which direction they wanted Jesus and Damian, their antichrist villain, to go in.

  “You guys still stuck?” Jonathan asked.

  Both roommates nodded.

  “We are still trying to decide on a trigger event,” Collin said.

  “There has to be something in their upbringing,” Hayden said, “a moment that starts each of them down the road to savior or destroyer. The thing is, the villain’s story isn’t that different from the hero’s. Something happens to each that molds their perspectives in different extremes.”

  “See, we want it to be the same event for both of them,” Collin said. “Jesus has to walk away and begin the road to Christhood while Damian begins the road to antichristhood. It’s just hard to create an event that would lead Damian to condone the suffering of others, while creating the polar opposite in Jesus.”

  Jonathan nodded somewhat blankly, seeing as he didn’t have any insight on the matter.

  Collin sighed. “Let’s table it for now,” he said. “I’ve got an idea that might work, but I need to flesh it out.”

  Hayden agreed, seeming all too happy to have an excuse to move on.

  “Any thoughts on the final straw?” Collin asked. “When they officially acknowledge one another as enemies. What sets them irreparably at odds?”

  “It’s a tough spot, since Christianity’s message is one of forgiveness of sins and loving your enemy and all that. You have to make a core exception in order for Jesus to be at odds with anyone, really,” Hayden said.

  Collin nodded. “But the antichrist doesn’t have to fit into that box,” he said. “The obvious angle for Damian would be that, upon learning that God banished his father to Hell—”

  “Objection,” Hayden said, interrupting. “The Bible doesn’t actually say that Lucifer was cast into Hell. If anything, it depends on interpretation.”

  Collin gave it some thought, but seemed to shrug it off. “Our readers aren’t biblical scholars. It’s a comic book. We can get away with the pop culture assumptions of Christianity.”

  Jonathan shut his eyes, rubbing his forehead with his fingers as he fought to keep from smiling. These two never stopped baiting one another with passive-aggressive insults.

  “Let me hear it,” Hayden said.

  “Damian goes all antichrist after learning that God imprisoned his father in Hell. But, since God is out of reach in Heaven, Jesus becomes the next best target. He can’t exactly ransom Jesus for his father’s release from Hell, but he can at least take his revenge on the Son.”

  “Why does that plot line sound painfully familiar?” Hayden said.

  Collin’s face grew smug. “Well, it’s pretty much the story of General Zod,” Collin said. “You know, the famous Superman villain. Which makes sense, because Superman and Jesus are the same char—”

  “Objection,” Hayden said. “Zod’s son didn’t come after Superman. Zod did it himself. I mean, if we are sticking strictly to the ‘modern pop culture’ Christopher Reeve version.”

  Collin glowered back at his roommate. “Technically, it is still revenge brought on by the actions of the father.”

  “Oh ‘technically?’” Hayden said, pretending to push his glasses up from the end of his nose while using his best “nerd” voice. He snorted to complete the effect. “Overruled,” he said. “You lose.”

  Jonathan found himself interrupting. “Is this what you guys do now? I mean the court room jokes—is that the thing now?”

  Collin and Hayden ignored him, which was fine with Jonathan, because the microwave dinged.

  “We both lose,” Collin said. “Superman’s father, Jor-El, was the one who cast Zod into the Phantom Zone, a perfect analogy for God casting Lucifer into Hell. Remember what Zod says to Jor-El right before he banishes him?”

  Hayden gave his friend a who-do-you-think-you’re-talking-to expression, before going on to quote the line in-character: “You will bow down before me Jor-El, both you,” Hayden said. “And then one day, your heirs!”

  Collin nodded. “You’re making my point,” he said. “Picture a panel, somewhere toward the end of the story, where the antichrist stands over Christ and says, ‘Jesus of Nazareth, Son of God, kneel before Damian!’”

  Now holding his food, Jonathan watched in quiet fascination as Hayden at first stared blankly at Collin. Then, Hayden’s foot began to tap the floor—accelerating excitedly with each passing second.

  “Okay! Okay!” he finally said. “How do we make this work?” He looked at the linoleum, shaking his head as he tried to think of a way to bridge the stories. When the answer came to him, his face took on a calm, self-assured smile. “The Holy Trinity,” he whispered.

  As Jonathan watched, Collin’s fired-up anticipation seemed to diminish into an unenthused blankness. “I don’t get it,” Collin said.

  “Christians,” Hayden said, “believe that Jesus, God, and the Holy Spirit are all the same being existing in different forms at the same—”

  “No, I know what the Trinity is,” Collin said. “I just don’t see how it helps.”

  “If Lucifer’s son is an evil reflection of Jesus, then it stands to reason that the antichrist would have an anti-Spirit,” Hayden said.

  “Anti-Spirit… sounds like a stick of deodorant.”

  “Fine, an Unholy Spirit, then,” Hayden said.

  “Okay, I’m listening.”

  “The point is that attacking Jesus could be the same as attacking God; meanwhile, Damian being the son doesn’t matter either, because he, too, is both Lucifer and Damian at the same time.”

  Collin’s expression became pained. “Oh, man, that is convoluted. I never understood this whole part of Christianity. I mean, God and Jesus, okay, one’s a god and one’s a man—but what’s the difference between God and the Holy Spirit?” Collin asked.

  Hayden started to respond, then frowned. “It’s complicated,” Hayden replied. “The Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit is sort of a metaphor for how God reaches out and asserts His will on Earth.”

  “Hmm…. Are you sure that isn’t the modern pop culture definition?”

  Hayden squirmed a bit. “Maybe?”

  Jonathan began to leave the room with his food, but slowed as he saw Collin’s smile growing smug again, something that didn’t go unnoticed by Hayden either.

  “What?” Hayden asked.

  “Would you say the Holy Spirit is kinda like God’s smart phone?” Collin asked.

  Hayden glared at his roommate. “No,” he said. “I would say that is a pretty crap analogy.”
>
  “I don’t know,” Collin said. “My phone is the tool I use to exert my will on the internet.”

  As Jonathan shook his head and departed up the stairs, Hayden’s voice grew irritated: “The Holy Spirit isn’t a tool,” he said. “You, on the other hand…”

  On the arrivals concourse of SeaTac airport, Olivia’s driver opened the sedan’s rear passenger door for her. Beside her empty seat, Olivia found Agent Rivers waiting for her.

  “Welcome back,” Rivers said.

  “Thank you,” she replied. “I assume you’ve been brought up to speed?”

  “Yes. There was a development while you were in the air. I felt you would want to know as soon as you landed,” he said. He reached into his briefcase and produced a folder. “I’m still getting used to working with hard copies.”

  He handed the folder over and Olivia found photos of an olive-skinned woman dismounting a motorcycle. The girl was in the parking lot of what appeared to be a motel outside of downtown Seattle.

  “Who am I looking at?” she asked.

  “A Miss Rylee Silva. She showed up at the household earlier this morning. She spoke briefly with one of the other male roommates, and then with Jonathan Tibbs. The surveillance team watching attempted a recording, but as you indicated would be the case, the audio was useless. From what I gathered, no one has seen this woman on the premises before.”

  “How was her identity confirmed?” Olivia asked.

  “The license plate on the motorcycle was legit—New York based,” he said. “Background information is still being researched, but we’ve confirmed she has relatives on the East Coast, and her family moved here from Brazil a little less than two decades ago. That was all we had uncovered before I left to meet you.”

  “You felt this could not wait until I returned to the office?” she asked.

  “None of that was the strange part. I was able to partially read what Ms. Silva and Jonathan discussed via the surveillance camera in the garage. Jonathan was confused by the woman’s presence; it was clear from his body language that he didn’t know her. Ms. Silva, however, became quite emotional, and embraced him as though they were intimate friends. When he pushed her away, she seemed upset—left in a hurry. Given there is no record of them meeting, and Jonathan has been under constant surveillance for months, I thought you would want to be informed.”

  Olivia flipped to one of the pictures. It was taken with a long-range lens somewhere outside the residence. Ms. Silva was in the foreground, and Olivia could make out Jonathan, somewhat out of focus, behind her. Rylee was mounting her bike, about to pull her helmet down. A clear wet line shined down her cheek.

  “If she was acting, then Ms. Silva has no trouble bringing herself to tears at will,” Rivers said.

  “Yes,” she said. “I’ll make a note to discuss this with my superior. He should be flying in, himself, shortly. In addition, our informant will need to be brought up to speed on whatever we can uncover about Ms. Silva. Was there anything else?”

  “Yes,” Agent Rivers said. He appeared to grow uncomfortable with what he was about to ask. “Does the name ‘Mr. Clean’ mean anything to you?”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  JONATHAN LEFT HIS laptop on the bed beside him in the hopes that he would seem casual when he reached for it. He’d been pretending to read a paperback off his bookshelf for the last half hour while trying not to glance at the clock too frequently. When he felt he’d put on a decent enough performance, he tossed the book, grabbed the computer, and flipped up the monitor. The desktop loaded as he got the earbuds in and leaned back in the chair as far as he could without being obvious.

  Nothing unusual happened immediately, and, unsure of what to do next, he opened a browser window. Heyer never showed up when he wanted him to, so why would Mr. Clean be any different? Still, there had to be some way to get the A.I.’s attention. Jonathan started typing, “Mr. Clean, Mr. Clean,” into the search engine as he hummed the old commercial jingle.

  The screen flickered then, and the cartoon’s face appeared, wearing an unamused expression. “Not very subtle, Jonathan.”

  Sorry, but I’m rather concerned about my loss of memory, he typed. Have you figured out the glitch?

  “I have a highly probable theory. Unfortunately, it’s a contingency I cannot discuss with you.”

  That’s it? Jonathan typed. You know what’s happened, but you aren’t going to tell me?

  “Heyer would want to be present,” Mr. Clean said. “Jonathan, it is a matter of discretion.”

  Can you at least tell me if it will happen again?

  “Yes,” Mr. Clean said. “It is highly probable that this event will repeat itself.”

  Jonathan closed his eyes and took a long breath to keep himself in check. He couldn’t exactly raise his voice or yell. He doubted that typing in all caps would have any effect on the computer.

  Can you tell me, Jonathan typed. Is there any possibility that memories from my life, outside of what took place within the gates, are being lost?

  “No,” Mr. Clean said. The cartoon avatar’s expression became curious. “That is a peculiar question. Have you experienced additional memory gaps from which you drew this conclusion?”

  Not exactly. Maybe, Jonathan typed. A woman appeared in my driveway this morning claiming to know me, but I had no recollection of her. Which means she was either nuts or my memory of her was lost. The timing is too close to be a coincidence.

  A small window appeared in the corner of the display, and footage from The Cell’s various cameras within the garage appeared. They were timestamped for today’s date, and Mr. Clean appeared to be fast-forwarding through one of the feeds facing Jonathan’s driveway from within the garage. Eventually, Collin appeared, opening the door and pushing his motorcycle outside. A few minutes later, Rylee pulled in. The moment she removed her helmet, the footage froze.

  “Facial recognition matches the female to a Rylee Silva. An analysis of her credit card transaction history and cellular GPS coordinates show she has been thousands of miles away from you for the majority of your life. It is therefore highly unlikely that you’ve crossed paths,” Mr. Clean said. “This is sufficient evidence to conclude that your memories outside of the yesterday’s incident do not need to be called into question.”

  Well, at least there’s that, Jonathan thought.

  Can you tell me, did the source of this glitch occur on the Feroxian side of the gates? Is it related to something one of the Ferox did on the other side? he typed.

  “No, Jonathan, that is not the case,” Mr. Clean said. “Even if there was a means to do so, the rules forbid any tampering with your memories.”

  The rules. Jonathan remembered that Heyer had once told him that there were rules that the brothers had agreed on. He had only been told of one of them, which said that outside of the implant, Heyer was not allowed to provide a human any assistance that was outside of earthly means. Jonathan had not yet had an opportunity to ask what other rules were in play, though he got the sense that the rules weren’t necessarily something Heyer’s integrity forbade him from bending. Rather, something he cheated for the benefit of mankind if he knew his brother would not be able to discover it. The thing was, Jonathan assumed that Malkier likely had the same attitude on behalf of the Ferox, which lead him to wonder if Mr. Clean was really telling him that his memory should not have been tampered with—not that it could not have been.

  Are you allowed to tell me the rules? Jonathan asked.

  “Yes,” Mr. Clean said. “Most of them, at least.”

  Jonathan frowned. How many are there? he typed.

  “A few hundred,” Mr. Clean said.

  When concern showed on Jonathan’s face, Mr. Clean reminded him that he needed to keep his expression calm. “Understand, most of these rules have no bearing on the means by which man and Ferox engage. A majority are safety protocols concerned with the use of the gates themselves.”

  I once asked Heyer for a weapon, something from his
species that I could use against the Ferox. Something a little deadlier than a fancy spear, Jonathan typed. He said it wasn’t allowed.

  “Yes, and as you would assume, this was, in part, to deny you an unfair advantage. However, even if Heyer had access to such things, he could not have left Borealis technology in your possession.”

  Borealis? Jonathan asked.

  “A term we use for Heyer’s ancestors,” Mr. Clean said. “Borealis is the English translation most frequently heard by humans when a Ferox makes reference to their gods in battle. Of course, the Ferox do not realize that their gods and Heyer’s ancestors are one and the same, and so the term is as good as any. But in regards to my original point, Heyer could not leave advanced technology where it would fall into the hands of your surveillance team.”

  But Excali-bar doesn’t concern you? Jonathan asked.

  “The staff is a crude tool. It doesn’t give its holder any particular edge over a sharp stick, aside from being far more difficult to break. In addition, the weapon is not true Borealis steel. Excali-bar is made of materials harvested from Earth, but forged using a Borealis metallurgy process.”

  Thinking about it, Jonathan saw that the computer had a point. He could imagine numerous applications for the steel: it would certainly make for an innovative new building material, vehicle armor plating, a better bullet proof vest, or even a better bullet, for that matter. However, Excali-bar itself was just a piece of steel in the end. It wouldn’t make much difference unless mankind could reverse-engineer it in large quantities.

  “So what other rules can I know?” he typed.

  Mr. Clean’s face shrunk so that it was only filling half of the monitor, and on the other half, white text began to scroll on a black screen.

  Neither Borealis will intervene in conflicts until one combatant remains

  Arena environment restricted to Earth

  Human survivors retain their memory

  Humans who would possess a device compatibility exceeding 43% are disqualified